Forget the car space it’s time to get on your bike

The times they are a changing at such a pace it’s hard to remember whether your phone opens with a PIN, a fingerprint or by just staring lovingly at it. We’re becoming more urban, more urbane, more loving of apartment life and enjoying a world where we can live happily without owning a car.

What would have been sacrilege a mere generation ago is now becoming the norm – apartment blocks that don’t have car parking spaces for every apartment. Some don’t have them at all.

Former six-lane Swanston St will soon exclude cars altogether

Why and how could this happen? Is it because we don’t manufacture cars in this country anymore? More likely that it’s cheaper to buy an apartment with no car space.

An ever growing percentage of us that live in apartments enjoy living in walking distance of public transport, shops, schools, cafes, restaurants and don’t have much need for a car.

Urban planners are busy building us light rail (call them trams, it’s a perfectly good word) bike paths and pedestrian precincts to make the car a nuisance rather than an asset.

See how our future could already be happening in Sweden on the next page.